Excerpt from The Messiah-Ideal, Vol. 1: Comparative Religious Legislations, Doctrines Forms Unfolding That Ideal, Jesus of Nazareth, His Aspirations and Ethical Legislation Historically Developed
It is not necessary here to rehearse the popular, ex aggerated verdicts to which have been carried the biased estimates concerning the authors and the writings con stituting the several canons, excesses committed both by their adherents and by their opponents. The people usually extol tomorrow what they have vilified yesterday. A close examination of facts shows that the author of the Sermon on t/ze [mount was simply the exponent and flower of all the best and noblest ever uttered in Judaea; that the fine Paulinian chapter on charity, just as his unique logic, were the bloom and the gold dust of the mystic Hellenists of his age. Even so was Islam the flower and fruit of the most thoughtful Koreischits of Arabia. Each of them was the choicest of the chosen ones. But each was, what he had to be; he could not be otherwise! Each did the best and the noblest of his epoch, amalgamated with the unavoidable alloy of his national and local environments. And just because they did that, viz: the best and the fittest which their time allowed, they have earned their places in the human pantheon; even their dark and weak sides became per fections and were necessary, just as an alloy Of brass is to the silver Of the goldsmith.
This adaptation proved to be the nerve of the Sacred Books, the secret of their strength, the cause of their having been accepted by their respective adherents as their Bible, their divine guidance, their rule of conduct.
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